Report -DLO Caversfield Decontamination Bunker/Labs, Bicester Dec '11

grumpy sod

On the opposite side of the road to RAF Bicester sits the old communal part of the base. When the base closed for good in the 1990s it was handed over to the DLO (Defence Logistics Organisation).

The DLO at the Caversfield site in Bicester was responsible for the clothing the armed forces wear all around the world, and making sure the clothing performs to the satisfaction of the MoD which included armoured 'flak' jacket testing with ammunition, rigorous testing of tents and tests-to-destruction of other clothing including socks and gloves.

The DLO site was sold off recently to a housing developer and work has begun in earnest to convert the existing buildings to 140-odd dwellings plus the building of 40-odd more. After finishing the airfield side me and TBM took a look at this minty fresh derp....and after dodging the CCTV found ourselves in the middle of the sprawl of buildings.

Some of the many buildings on site, all inaccessible

After poking round the outside of a few buildings with no luck we made our way to one of two bunkers on site....and lo-and-behold a nice little decontamination bunker revealed itself to us. Or at least it was one once, unfortunately after closure like many other places the MoD rips everything out and that came after the whole site was given a refurbishment by the DLO. But there was a nice satisfying 'bzzzzt-clunk' as all the lights came on. Oh yes, the whole site still has power and is totally and utterly unchavved and unpikeyed just stripped out. We had a look around many of the buildings on site and almost all were locked up tight except the bunker and one of the large laboratory buildings used to test and develop clothing and textiles for the army but by the end we were rapidly running out of light so couldn't have done much more even if we wanted to.

The lab building we eventually found a way into, bigger than it looks. Once again all the power was on, although we didn't turn any lights on because it is right next to houses across the busy road. To be honest this building probably had the most stuff left in it! You can see on the inside where tape marks out where doors are to be punched or whole walls demolished in the conversion.

One last look out of a window as the sun was setting...

I may go back at some point to see if anything else opens up but tbh it's just empty rooms except the other, bigger bunker which looked to be alarmed. So maybe I'll get lucky.